I also did a fun interview for the Celebrating Debutantes festival for debut YA authors. Curious about my celebrity crushes? Of course you are. (Crucial disclaimer: I wrote the interview before I watched Twin Peaks, so sadly Kyle MacLachlan does not make an appearance -- although he does in my heart.)

And we're still recapping Game of Thrones and Mad Men every Monday night on Overthinking It, so hop over if you want to watch us subject these television shows to a level of scrutiny they probably don't deserve.

You know what makes me sad? When I hear
women writers saying, “I don't think I can write a male main
character. I'm just can't get the voice down.”

Please don't say that. It makes me want
to cry.

If you've said something along these
lines before, let me offer some reassurance. Of course, you can write
a male main character.

Let me repeat that with big capital
letters for emphasis. OF COURSE, you can write a male main character!
I'm sure of it. Why am I so sure? Easy! There's no such thing as a
“male voice.”

Boys.

I'm not a man, and I don't have
mind-reading powers (yet!), but I do have the next-best thing to
telepathy: books. I read a lot of books. Having gone to a schmancy
college with a fairly old-fashioned English department, I've read a
mountain of books by men, primarily and unfortunately white Western
men. I also watch a lot of movies and television, most of which are
made by men. This unhealthy amount of media consumption has given me
the confidence to say that I have a good handle on what (primarily
white, Western, able-bodied, heterosexual, cisgendered) men are
like—and I bet you do, too! They are, after all, the dominant
culture.

Based on this lifetime of research, we
can come to the following, not-so-shocking conclusion: Men are
different. I don't mean from women1.
I mean from each other.

There was even a scientific study2
proving that this is so. Researchers found that, for the most part,
men and women aren't all that dissimilar, personality-wise, but
individual men can vary substantially from other men. But I don't
need science to tell me this, because I know men, and also I read
books, and books tell me men are varied creatures.

Let's do a little experiment. When you
hear or read the term “male voice,” what do you think of? Punchy,
“muscular” sentences and little description? All male gaze all
the time? Little affection or romance and little philosophy? A lot of
machismo and little to no complaining?

Whatever your idea of the typical male
voice is, keep it in your head for a second.

Now consider this list of characters:

Holden Caulfield

Don Quixote

Okonkwo

Gilgamesh

Tom Sawyer

Bilbo Baggins

Don Juan

Stephen Dedalus

Yossarian

Arthur Dent

Oscar Wao

Tyrion Lannister

Tom Joad

You get where I'm going with this. All
of these characters? Male, written by men, all extremely different
from one another. I know they're all different because I've been in
their heads. I know how they think. So do you, probably. You know
some men are macho and some are neurotic. You know some men are
taciturn and some are florid. You know some are cold and others
affectionate3,
some are all about the body and some are all about the mind, and some
are loners while some would do anything for their friends and family.
Etcetera, etcetera, etcetera.

Just look at poetry written by men!
Compare Basho to Wordsworth to Rumi to Eliot to Juvenal to Donne to
Larkin to Auden to Hughes to Pope to Yeats to Whitman to Homer to
Hughes to Ginsburg to Carroll to Neruda4.
You cannot look at that list and tell me there is such a thing as a
male voice. And if there's no such thing as a male voice, trust me,
you can write a male character5.
Just write a human. Perhaps that human acts a little differently from
a woman, because he has privileges she does not, and perhaps he's
been socialized to act a certain way by his elders. Then again, maybe
he hasn't. It depends on the character.

Long story short, to write all male
characters as if they're all the Marlboro Man or Seth MacFarlane is
doing men a disservice, and it's doing boy readers a disservice. Why
not show them there are many different ways to be a man? It's not
about being politically-correct6.
It's about being accurate.

5A
short aside: Although I think it's difficult for women to screw up
writing male characters, from what I've seen, it's not too hard for
male writers to screw up when writing female characters. To you
guys, I give the same advice. Write humans (while bearing in mind
that women are often treated as second-class citizens, especially if
they are of a certain race, class, or other minority group). Also
try to remember that women don't think about how hot their boobs are
all the time. I mean, every once in a while, sure, but we don't wake
up every morning and think, “Boy, are my knockers firm and plump
today! I can't wait to rub soap all over them sensually in the
shower in case some male reader happens to be watching!” Hope that
helps.

Authors are so frequently asked where they get their ideas from that I sometimes think they might flip out like Geoffrey Tennant on Slings & Arrows: Yes, I was inspired by my parents—and my teachers and every play I ever seen and every book I've ever read and everything ever! And it wouldn't be untrue. Inspiration comes from everywhere, and teasing out exactly where you got each idea and character from is an exercise in not-gonna-happen-ery.

That said, sometimes you realize long after you've written something that the ideas you thought were so clever and original were actually unintentional ripoffs of other, usually greater, works of art. Or, in my case, cartoons. I'm an avowed animation fan—I spent this beautiful weekend hidden inside BAM so I could watch Princess Mononoke for the millionth time—so this is not surprising. But it is a little amazing how neatly the characters from Hammer of Witches line up with the 'toons I watched as a kid.

And I'm sure there are more cartoon connections I haven't thought of yet. If you think of one, let me know!

Hmm, it now occurs to me that some of you might be more willing to pick up a copy of Hammer of Witches if I make a comparison to some super-hot bishonen-type character that all the girls swoon over. Like I could say that Baltasar is exactly the same as Avatar: The Last Airbender's Prince Zuko, except he's even hotter and more brooding and...

...and actually this is the far more realistic Avatar comparison. Sorry, Zuko fans. Maybe next time?

[PS - The Hammer of Witches hardcover is out NOW! Go buy a copy of the book Kirkus calls "an engaging, magical adventure." You can get the audiobook here. E-book coming soon.]